Photographers Request

[palalnz]

alanthompson.co.nzHi, i'm taking some time to write this so please consider it.

1) There is an opportunity with the axing of Aperture to get a whole lot of clients. Most use it as the RAW developer is just so good. i do. Good exposure limits tonal quality, hence ETTR. Aperture recovers the highlight detail the best via winding back the exposure. This gives better tonal detail in shadows. So the really have a look at how Affinity does this. A recovery slider like Adobe etc really is a joke as it just turns the brightness down. True detail is recovered with the exposure slider.

2) Don't pre adjust our RAWs when opening. Adobe RAW 2012 pre adjusts your images and especially  ETTR when opening them. You cane even undo what they have done. This is incredibly arrogant, just stunningly stupid. It neglects the fact that correct exposure in digital limits tonal range. it's just physics.

3) Don't allow computer nerds to dictate. Ask some photographers, not amateurs, actually people that understand the physics.

4) Make you software able to record and play actions like Photoshop does. It's one thing i miss in Aperture.

5) Its very unlikely you will be able to complete head to head with Lightroom & Photoshop in the sort term, even though the Lightroom RAW uses the 2012 Adobe version which pre-adjusts your RAWs. So make your RAW developer able to be used as a plugin, I would use it if it works as well as Aperture RAW engine, even the Capture 1 version.

6) get some Photographers on your side, if you do, we tell everyone and give you free promotion as we are passionate about our art and the quality of how software treats our work.

lastly, here's some links I would recommend, probably begs you to have a look at as it will help, also what the guygowan.com videos. As said, you have an opportunity to take the market in RAW development as Adobe and Apple seem to have no interest in real photography.
https://luminous-landscape.com/expose-right/
http://www.guygowan.com/focus
https://alangraemethompson.wordpress.com/2015/01/17/the-disaster-of-adobe-raw-2012-developer/

 

[r10k]

As a photographer myself (and an Aperture user) I'm not sure I agree with a lot of what you've written. The point about ETTR is an interesting one, but since doing so in most cases will kick up ISO, it probably isn't worth it (as one of your linked articles also mentioned). Also, when it comes to exposure adjustments versus recovery, it all comes down to the algorithms used. Aperture's recovery is completely different to Lightroom's, as is every other adjustment, even if named the same thing. Anyhow, I'm sure Serif will handle things well...

[palalnz]

The ETTR iso problem is not really an issue i think as iso on digital cameras in just amazing now, on my 12bit Sensor Sony A900 it means iso 320 instead of 160, there is a difference in my case, a bir more noise, but the shadow detail is out of the area where the noise is, but i can leave the iso at 160 and just use a slightly slower shutter speed. As there is image stabilisation and amazing quality in iso up to even 3600 on some cameras, it's really not an issue. Getting right in camera limits the tonal quality. I use +0.7 to +1.0ev. The shadow detail is just so much better. It does mean I need to stop looking at the camera as a camera, it's a data recorder that a RAW developer adjusts later. I do wonder why we are stuck with a film exposure system on a digital system, why don't they do ETTR in camera? it would improve things by at least 25%! One thing I do wonder is if the lens treats the light differently at higher ev?This reminds me of when I was a recording tech in the 80 & 90's when digital arrived. it sucked, but much later i realised I was treating it like analoge. Which distorts at high levels and had soft treble  and bass, Digital did not have those problems so the recording sounded harsh and bass heavy. It was only when I started to understand the strengths and weaknesses of digital did I make much better recordings... why have I told you this? well while at uni 5 years ago doing a photography BA, I had a deja vu moment when i realised with film and digital, it was the same. We did not understand the new mediums strengths and weaknesses.

[palalnz]

Lastly, this is an example of what not to do. Pleas fix your software to not interpret and change my RAW.  This photo was a mistake, when opening in Aperture it looks very dark and is unaltered, yet when the same RAW is opened in Affinity, it's been changed in the background by the Affinity developer by about +2ev in the shadows and about -1ev in the highlights. Yet all the adjustments show "Zero" like nothing has been done to it. That is a severe problem, your saying this is what it should look like in our opinion. Really? why cant you just let us see it? Or even just set the sliders to show what you have really done? That way we can undo it

You can see the same thing going on in the Adobe RAW 2012, compare the 2010 with the 2012 and you can see the 2010 shows the blown blacks as they are.

Once again, please stop this, photographers blow the highlights and blacks sometimes on purpose and having you “fix” and show it as unchanged as slider are all set to zero it actually means people will think they stuffed it up, they blew them on purpose but Affinity does not show it meaning they will try and set the camera differently where in fact it’s the software preventing us seeing the real image!https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.949501641740887.1073741841.131079173583142&type=1

[ronnyb]

You guys should check out this thread and last comment by Andy, one of the dev...

 

https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/8158-pre-development-on-opening-please-fix-this/